Odyssey
by HeroicBlogger
Summary: These are the Voyages of the Starship Odyssey...
1. Chapter 1

_These Are the Voyages…_

_Chapter 1_

_Captain's Personal Log, Stardate 61476.7,_

_The Odyssey is currently undergoing retrofitting at the Utopia Planitia Fleetyards. Several key systems, including her warp core and phaser banks, have come to the end of their operational lifetimes and need to be swapped out. This monumental task will take some time to complete but under our Chief Engineer's direction, I'm certain that it will take less time than the Corps thinks it will. _

_Most of the ship's crew has already taken the opportunity for shore leave. After two long years on patrol along the Klingon border, I can hardly blame them in their desire for release. _

_It's these times I feel most separated from the rest of my crew. Whereas most of them have family to go back to, all I have is my apartment in the Presidio waiting for me. _

Captain Benjamin James Adams ran a hand through his dark brown hair slowly. His eyes, blue like a stormy sea he was once told, moved over the Spartan accommodations of his apartment. Ancient history books, some mementos of his football career at the Academy and a bed and that was him in one room.

What it said about the man was that he didn't like clutter. He learned from the past and he valued teamwork. Summed up a starship captain rather well.

The girl who had seen the ocean in his eyes had not been, unlike the waters she described, been forever. His first extended deep-space assignment had seen to that fact. Seems she had wanted a man who'd be there for her or some female nonsense like that, he tried to forget.

Fortunately, being the captain of a starship like the _Odyssey_ allowed him ample opportunity _to_ forget. Not like other ships' captains had it easy but as one of Starfleet's vanguard, the _Odyssey _was often pressed into the most difficult and volatile of situations as a show of force. Being her captain therefore meant increased time away from his personal thoughts. It was better that way, of course. Being the captain meant no time for anything other than the ship. He wondered if other captains felt the same way. He heard they did. That was some comfort, at least.

He shrugged off the Fleet bomber jacket he had recently taken to wearing. It was a more practical uniform than the standard duty uniform he had worn for a few years prior. Which, of course, were light years beyond the dull monochrome jumpsuits Starfleet Command had inflicted upon the galaxy five years ago. They had fortunately not lasted.

Seemed certain members of the Federation press had felt they looked rather akin to what earlier humans might have called 'footy pajamas'. Starfleet had decided that 'footy pajamas' was not the right image they wished to be presenting to the enemies at their gates.

He looked over at the low table on which were models of the ships he had served on. Models he had built himself down to the last detail. The _Odyssey_ was of course at the forefront, gleaming, her navigational beacons flashing silently. He picked her up, gazing over her critically. He'd have to adjust the look of the phaser banks and the deck plating under the warp core. Finally something to occupy him in this interminable wait between adventures. He glanced around the deserted apartment with a wry smile.

_Not like anything was going to happen here on Earth, _the Starfleet officer of fifteen years experience thought to himself.

Something Happening took that moment to press the chime to his quarters.

_Chapter 2_

Ben frowned. Nobody knew he was here on Earth. None of his friends among the crew made their home anywhere within ten parsecs of him. Could be trouble. Well, what's a little trouble among friends.

"Come!" He called as he set down the model starship and turned to face the doors as they slid apart to reveal….

His eyes blinked involuntarily at the vision of loveliness that stood before him. She was beautiful, there was not a man alive who could have looked at her and believed himself to be the luckiest man alive to be standing in the same room as her, luckier still to be the only man. Somehow she was familiar to him and yet…something was wrong. Something seemed off. Something that was bothering the hell out of him and he wanted to know why.

All this was thought within the span of the few paces it took to get to the door. She didn't speak, just stood there, eyes focused on him. Then she spoke.

"Captain Adams?" Her voice was firm, lightly accented in an accent that was not quite human but not quite alien, either.

"Yes, can I help you?" His eyes moved from her dark blue ones, then down to her hands. Beautiful could also mean deadly. A lifetime spent in space had taught him that lesson. It was one he had learned the hard way as a youth. They were held at her sides, the fingertips betraying the only hint of nerves he could perceive in her.

She nodded, "I…I hope you can, I don't know where else to turn. They…they…" Her voice caught as her composure crumbled a little, her voice choking with what Ben thought to be fear. Somebody, somebody_s_ he corrected himself, were after this girl. Best get her inside if he hoped to find out what was troubling her.

"Please, come in, come in." He stepped aside and nodded for her to enter. She hesitated but then stepped through quickly. Obviously coming to him represented some sort of decision for her from which there was little likelihood of being able to return home.

"Er, could I get you something to drink, eat, anything?" He watched her as her eyes darted about growing more and more nervous as she stood there. The shaking which had started in her fingertips had reached her hands by now.

"Some water?' The voice was still remarkably clear, although she had to be close to losing even that bit of control. Still, it was an impressive testament to her that she had held together this long.

Judging by the way her eyes darted to the window and how she had then made her way quickly to a position where she could not be seen by anyone who happened to be looking through the large plate of transparent aluminum, it was clear this girl was running scared.

Only two questions kept coming to him as he got her her water, _Why me?_ Followed closely by _Who is she? _Answering who she was would also answer another question: _How had she known my name?_

He brought the cold water to where she stood. She took it and with both hands drank it quickly, her eyes never leaving him. What emotion was being played across them, he couldn't be certain. Finally her soft lips parted and she began to speak.

_Chapter 3_

"You knew my father. He said…he said that if anything happened, anything at all, I was to find you, he…" Her whole body was starting to shake now, the composure she had had to make it this far almost completely spent as her emotions rolled through her body. The girl took in great deep breaths.

"It's okay, you're safe here. But, I'm confused. Who's your father?" His friends weren't old enough to have daughters her age. As far as he knew, none of his friends even had children.

"My name is Elizabeth Branson, my father is..was…" Her voice broke a little, she paused as the name .

"Professor Branson? From the Academy? But I haven't seen him in… in fifteen years."

Ben looked at her with dawning recognition. He remembered the little girl who had sat quietly in her father's office at Starfleet Academy during his final year there, reading her books, playing with her dolls and the young woman before him had her face given fifteen years of aging.

She nodded, "He's dead."

"I'm sorry. What happened?"

Elizabeth took a breath, "They killed him. Hunted him down and killed him. He was just a teacher, not a soldier, not like you."

"But why?" The Professor Branson that Ben remembered had been almost a pacifist. He was a military historian. A very good one but he couldn't imagine anyone wanting to kill the man.

She looked away, her jaw tight, "Daddy got involved with…with something big. Something he couldn't even talk to me about. And he told me everything."

"Do you even know who he was working for…was it Starfleet?"

"I…I don't know, I don't think it was." She hesitated, then looked back up at him, "At least not officially. They never showed up in uniform but I know I recognized them." Her hands fidgeted in her lap. "I…I think I did anyway. I never got a good look at them."

"Were they the ones who had your dad killed?" Ben frowned, he didn't like undercover operations. Never had. They had the tendency to give the people in charge of them an undue feeling that they were beyond the ordinary rules of society.

She shook her head, setting long thick blonde hair swaying about her face, "No. Klingons."

"Klingons? But they haven't been active, not that I've heard anyway." Adams frowned. He should know, he had been out on their borders for the last couple of years.

"Not the regular Klingon military. Rebels. Outside the Empire's command."

"How do you know?"

She shrugged, "No uniform, no sash. You know Klingons. They'd rather be dead than be seen without their badges of honor or whatever. Besides, they were still using old Romulan disruptors. Old equipment, no uniform, no sash, I kind of figured…."

He nodded in agreement, "Yeah, sounds like rebels to me." It had been decades since the last noted exchange of technology between the two Empires, Romulan and Klingon, had taken place. Indeed, their relationship, never exactly cordial to begin with, had been becoming considerably chillier within the last few years. For a band of Klingons to still be using Romulan disruptors therefore likely indicated a faction long separated from the traditional Klingon military pathways.

Of course, that could just be how they _wanted_ it to look.

"But why did he send you to see me? I mean, I got along well with your father but as far as I knew he viewed me as just another student." Adams looked at the girl, waiting patiently, not pushing her. She looked so lost leaning against the wall, her eyes focused on nothing in these quarters anyway. He gathered that she hadn't expected to make it this far and now she had and she didn't know what to do with herself now. He wanted to tell her it was going to be okay but he didn't want to give her false hope either. She'd been through enough without being lied to by some Starfleet officer she had just met.

"He said you were the best. He said you were….were a good man. That's all he said. That's all I needed to know." Apparently her faith in her father was strong if that's all it took for her to basically commit her life to a man she had met almost her whole life ago. It was not his place to argue that decision, Ben decided. What was needed now though was action.

Even if inaction was that action.

"You need rest. Come on." He stepped back to allow her out of the corner. She didn't move, her eyes glancing fearfully at the open window. Ben knew what that glance meant. She thought they were being watched by her pursuers.

"It's okay, nobody can see us, Elizabeth."

"Right." She wasn't convinced.

Ben leaned over with a slight smile and drew the shades, "Now come on, and let's get you a shower, clean clothes and something to eat." He took her hand firmly. It was an instinct, a feeling like he knew she needed to be reassured that not only was she alive but that he was real, too. His instinct was right. Her eyes became focused on the here and now, her posture improved, recovering somewhat the assuredness she had had when she had come to his door.

"Thank you." And she meant it.

He nodded with his head down the hall, "Second door on your left. If you can't find something, just ask. Oh and…sorry if I don't have all the things a girl needs. It's just been me here for… a very long time." He said the last without reproach or note of sadness one might have expected from such a statement. Just matter of fact.

Elizabeth regarded him curiously. He was a handsome man, a man of some note, being a captain in Starfleet, surely there was someone at home for him, she thought. However, being tired and exhausted as she was she merely nodded and headed into the shower which looked as she had expected from the look of the rest of the apartment, rather spare of the amenities a girl wants. Just enough for what he needed day-to-day.

She had kept herself fit enough. Not that there had been much else to do on a little outpost. Just her, her father and a team of some twenty-odd research assistants, mostly men to keep her company and a nice little gym to give a way for the monotony to be broken. Not very good for a young girl's social life.

She looked in the small (to her) mirror above the sink, angled for a man to be able to supply his beard suppressor and trim his sideburns to Starfleet regulation. Elizabeth smiled to herself with a somewhat guilty look as she looked herself over. She was beautiful, she knew that, of course. It was hard not to know this fact with all the men who had desired her 'company' at the research outpost. She hadn't given it to them, of course. No, these men had just wanted her body as a reminder that they were men, not because they had any feelings for her. That's not to say she hadn't wanted to, after all, she was only…human.

There was some Vulcan blood in her, though, from a long ago tryst. Her Vulcan heritage came through at odd times. She would suddenly have moments where a complex problem which had been vexing her father would become clear, the solution presenting itself ordered, logical. There were no points on her ears or slant to her eyebrows and her blood was iron, not copper-based. Still, the idea that this young girl could understand things older and more experienced scientists often failed to understand themselves had further helped to isolate her.

Still lost in her thoughts, she shed her clothes and stepped blissfully into the hot shower which had snapped on as it had sensed her body inside. She smiled to herself more warmly now, indulging herself in what was considered a luxury on the outpost. Hot running water. For the moment, she was warm and felt safe and protected.

Out in the kitchen, Ben started to put together a suitable meal for two. Not knowing what her meal preferences were and not wanting to disturb her in the bathroom, he made a meat dish, chicken cordon bleu, and a vegetable dish, pasta primavera for them both. They were two of his favorites and two he could prepare with a reasonable degree of skill. As the water came to a boil, he let out a breath, trying to come to grips with some of the more disturbing thoughts which had been running through his mind since this girl had shown up at his door.

First and foremost was his reaction to her. This was the daughter of a man who had been his teacher and yet he found a part of himself wanting her. To be sure, she was a beautiful girl…woman, woman he reminded himself. She had to be in her mid-20s by now. But her beauty wasn't the only thing to which he found himself responding. There was also her fortitude which had guided her through what must surely have been a difficult journey far from home and alone. Not to mention the fact that if she was telling the truth about who was after her, she had managed to avoid capture by Klingon warriors. Not a simple feat, he knew from experience.

Yet now was not the time to explore those feelings. It'd be wrong. She was emotionally vulnerable right now and the pasta was done.

_Chapter 4_

Elizabeth toweled herself off and then realized something important.

She didn't have any clothes besides what she came in and she did _not_ want to wear those things again. Leaning out of the door as the steam escaped, she called out, "Um. Clothes?"

Ben paused, thinking, "Have to replicate some, what sizes do you take?" He said heading to the replicator. He hadn't even thought about it. Of course she wouldn't want to wear the clothes she had come in. And he hadn't thought to get her new clothes.

As he looked at the replicator, though, he realized he'd have to rely on the computer's knowledge of what a woman wears these days. Most of the ones he knew just wore the basic Starfleet uniform. Not much imagination to it, maybe but he thought it looked good. But as for civilian clothes? He was barely competent at picking his own civilian wear. Never mind for a twenty-four year old woman.

"Um, I'm not sure. Daddy usually took care of my clothes for me. A jumpsuit would do, though!" It was true, too. On the outpost, she hadn't had much option in what to wear. Everyone, boy and girl, man and woman, human and alien had worn the same blue and green jumpsuit. Form-fitting on some, loose on others.

"Alright, I think we can do that, let's see here." He went through some of the more popular styles of the day and then picked something that looked pretty mild. A plain white jumpsuit with a low back. It looked nice but nothing too much and hopefully nothing too plain. He also got her a pair of boots which were a bit more feminine than what he had noticed she had worn. Something with more of a heel. Women liked that, right?

After replicating it in a medium adult size he went to the bathroom and slipped it inside, keeping his back to the room. "Here you go, Elizabeth."

He felt a hand grope over his before grabbing the jumpsuit with the tops of the boots, "Thanks, and you can call me Liz or Lizzy. Anything but Elizabeth. Too formal."

She was impressed with him, though. Most men might have taken the opportunity to sneak a peek at the beautiful girl in their bathroom. She had found this to be true especially of the older men at the outpost. It was understandable, of course. She was young and beautiful and they wanted to still feel young and vital. Not that the captain was old like those other scientists had been but he was older. Still a gentleman, though and he was certainly far more attractive than the others had been.

She recognized she was vulnerable, of course. Scared, alone, very much alone, of course she was vulnerable. He could probably do anything he wanted to her and she wouldn't complain. She almost would have welcomed it. She was almost afraid he wouldn't. She was beautiful, wasn't she, wasn't she? He was a better man than most. Which probably meant he saw her as the kid from her daddy's office and he wouldn't want anything to do with that kid. But if it meant that he could help her, protect her, then she would not complain, would not make a move.

But dammit, she wished he would.


	2. Chapter 2

A minute or two later, she stepped out in the jumpsuit which was tight in all the right places according to her way of thinking and all the wrong places, according to his. Ben raised his eyes heavenward in supplication. With none coming, he merely headed to the kitchen to grab the dishes from the stove and oven.

"Hope you're hungry. I didn't know what you liked, so I just kind of…made a little bit of everything." He set the dishes down and made for the cupboard. She followed behind him.

"Please, I can set the table. It's the---the least I can do to help. After all you've done for me so far."

He was about to argue with her but the determined look in her eyes told him it would not be a winnable thing. Ben nodded and pointed towards the cupboard, "Plates and glasses are in there, silverware in the drawer under that cabinet. Okay, Liz?" He had remembered her preference for what to be called and it did seem to suit her better than Elizabeth.

He stood by the table, watching as she somewhat clumsily, more due to a natural lack of coordination than any remaining nerves, set the table for two. He didn't offer to help for he had a feeling she might view such an offer as an insult to her. After she had finished she sat down and he started to serve up the food.

"It all looks delicious. Um…what should I call you?" She finally asked now that the urgency had passed and left them quietly eating dinner together.

"Oh, um, Ben would be fine." He took a seat across from her after the plates were filled. Glancing over at her, she saw she looked at the food with wonder. He guessed things were a lot simpler with her father. Probably simple TKEs. That stuff would make even _gagh_ palatable. And he'd had _gagh_. It took a lot. This simple fare must seem like a gastronomical wonderland in comparison to that gruel.

"Well, eat up." He said, noting her hesitancy.

She started to tuck into the meal with gusto. He smiled at that for it meant her shaky nerves had been calmed, her adrenaline had stopped pumping and her body was remembering it needed fuel. This was good.

He remembered he hadn't eaten either since arriving on Earth nearly… he glanced at the chronometer on the wall and wasn't entirely shocked to find twelve hours had passed since he'd set foot back on terra firma.

They sat there together for awhile like this, just eating, enjoying the peace and quiet. Ben had to admit it was nice to be in the company of a beautiful woman for a change. In certain circles, he supposed his first officer would be called cute but… he smiled to himself at that thought, but he was no substitute for a beautiful cool blue-eyed blonde.

It was that happy thought which was his last as the wall next to them exploded, throwing him back against the opposite wall into blissful unconsciousness.


End file.
